Friday, July 15, 2011

My husband, Nate, is a behavioral researcher who collects fecal samples from baboons.

His boss is Hubert Murdash, emeritus professor of evolutionary biology at Stanford and senior author of a new report that suggests—contrary to what women assumed—men are not baboons.

The day before this important report was released—a report that would shake fundamental knowledge of biologists everywhere—I begged Nate. I pleaded with all my strength. I implored Nate to come clean and tell the authorities exactly how he had gathered evidence for the study.

See, I hope you can understand that I had just been so worried about my husband’s health. He had been acting so strangely since he started working as a researcher for Murdash. Who knows what inspired Nate to stray from the standard procedures of collecting fecal matter and studying that matter for stress hormones? Instead, my husband hacked into baboons’ cell phone voice messages, e-mail accounts, and facebook pages. My poor dear; he’s so conflicted. On one hand, he feels awful for invading the baboons’ privacy. On the other, he feels it necessary for the advancement of science. Scientific integrity is so much different from, say, journalistic integrity. When it comes to discovering something as important as—Men are not baboons—it is important to use whatever means necessary to prove the scientific truth. Besides, is hacking into phone messages really any less intrusive and humiliating than collecting and studying fecal matter (not to mention less fragrant)? That was Nate’s view on the matter, anyway. But I could tell that this corruption was torturing his poor soul.

Well, I’m sad to report that Nate went to work the day the report was released, and he hasn’t been home since. I suspect he's still out carousing with his cronies, the baboons. I just hope The Press doesn't catch wind of this hacking scandal. Old Murdash would get heat, and only Nate would be blamed for everything and lose his job. We need the income. So, let's just all nod and quietly agree Men are not Baboons.